2018 CCMA Award Nominations are Out

On September 17th in Hamilton, Ontario the 2018 Canadian Country Music Association (CCMA) Awards will take place and the nominations were released on July 9th. Topping the list of nominations were Flat Lake, Alberta native Brett Kissel and Langenburg, Saskatchewan native Jess Moskaluke who were each nominated for six awards. Kissel and Moskaluke will cross paths in 3 categories including the Apple Music Fans’ Choice Award.

The Apple Music Fans’ Choice Award has 10 nominees people can vote for. The nominees are Gord Bamford, Dean Brody, Chad Brownlee, Tim Hicks, High Valley, James Barker Band, Brett Kissel Jess Moskaluke, Dallas Smith, and the iconic Shania Twain. The category will be a hard one to predict as people can vote as often as they wish in three different ways, adding to difficulty of a large category. If you want to vote for this award you can do so by going to https://ccmafanvote.com/ as well hashtags on Facebook and Twitter, which can be found on the CCMA's webpage, alongside how the streaming voting will work.

In the artist of the year categories, they will multiple past winners. The Male Artist of the Year category has the last two past winners (each winning theirs back to back) in Brett Kissel, Gord Bamford joined by Chad Brownlee, Dallas Smith and Bobby Wills. In the Female Artist of the Year category it will feature a battle of the past and present as 5x winner Shania Twain and 3x winner Jess Moskaluke be featured alongside last year’s winner Meghan Patrick joined by Madeline Merlo, and Lindsay Ell. This might be the toughest of the two to call with so many past winners and all having extremely successful years.

In terms of group of duo of the year it will likely be between High Valley (2x winners), and James Barker band with Hunter Brothers, The Reklaws and Washboard Union rounding out the category. The Ford Album of the Year will be a heavily contested one with Meghan Patrick, Jess Moskaluke, Lindsay Ell, Brett Kissel and The Washboard Union all have a good shot at taking home the award.

This year’s CCMA Awards have more than ever had the feeling that anyone can win, with this year producing the strongest class of nominees in recent memory. Sadly you will have to wait for September 17th to find out who is bringing home the hardware.

For a complete list of nominations, including Radio and Industry Awards can be found here. As well tickets for the show can be purchased on Ticketmaster.